Army veterans claim recent studies prove that Gulf War Syndrome was caused by vaccines taken by troops.

For years experts have not been sure whether to blame these inoculations or the fall-out from depleted uranium - DU - shells used in the conflict.

However, two studies by King's College London have found twice as many veterans from the 1991 Gulf War are ill compared with those soldiers who have served in the latest conflict in which many more DU shells were used.

In 1991 soldiers were given an anthrax vaccine followed immediately by a whooping cough vaccine despite the combination not being licensed and the fact the Ministry of Defence had been warned it wasn't safe for adults from colleagues in the Department of Health.

No whooping cough vaccine was given to troops serving in the present Iraqi war.

Shaun Rusling, pictured right, of the National Gulf Veterans and Families Association, said: "Another difference is that in the latest war the vaccines have been spaced out with no other vaccine being delivered until at least five days after the anthrax inoculation.

"In the 1991 Gulf War we were given five vaccines in a day.

"What we have seen in the Gulf War veterans is a disease that has been born out of people's bodies being so overloaded with vaccines that their bodies couldn't cope.

"The only conclusion is that the whooping cough and anthrax vaccines are the main problem and cause of ill health in veterans."

The first study compared 4000 soldiers who went to Iraq with 4000 servicemen who were never deployed. The second contrasted the result of the first study with those of the 1991 Gulf War.

The researchers found that there were twice as many ill veterans from the Gulf War than from the Iraqi War and that the ill-health suffered by Iraqi veterans was not significantly different from those not deployed.

An MoD spokeswoman said: "A number of health and personnel lessons were identified.

"Improvements have been made to medical assessments, baseline immunisation status and the distribution of information regarding medical counter-measures to our forces.

"We welcome the research by King's College London, which was funded by the MoD. We have applied lessons from the 1991 Gulf Conflict and it is very good news for UK service personnel that there is no evidence of a repeat in the Iraqi conflict of the variety of symptoms reported by some Gulf veterans.

"The balance of scientific evidence does not support the suggestion that the ill health reported by some 1991 Gulf veterans has been caused by medical countermeasures, including vaccines."